This is the A-League's time to shine

EVER since Australian soccer developed its own national league in the late 1970s - the first in any code to truly cover the country - the fate of the game has been seen as firmly linked to the fate of the Socceroos.

If the national team was going well, received wisdom suggested the domestic game would prosper too.

Had Australia not succumbed to Iran at the MCG in that nightmare game in 1997 and actually qualified for the World Cup in France, who knows what might have happened for the old NSL. Ditto 2001, and the loss to Uruguay.

But the old game's loss was the new game's gain, and John Aloisi's penalty in November 2005 that took the Socceroos to the World Cup in Germany the following year provided the perfect launch platform for the A-League, which had kicked off barely a month before that emotional clash with Uruguay.

The new competition was able to leapfrog off the back of the euphoria of that qualifier and the better-than-expected heroics in Germany in the World Cup proper, giving soccer and the A-League the boost it so badly needed. This time round things are decidedly different. The Socceroos are struggling in what looks like a straightforward qualifying group with an ageing team battling to compete with countries ranked 60-plus places below it. Should they lose to Iraq later this month their chances of making it directly to Brazil 2014 would appear slim.

Yet the buzz around the kick-off to an A-League season has rarely been brighter, despite the Socceroos' travails. Far from being negatively affected by the defection of Harry Kewell, Tim Cahill's preference to play in America's Major League Soccer and the reluctance of Socceroo veterans such as captain Lucas Neill to return home and boost the domestic game, the A-League looks poised to prosper.

That, in large part, can be put down to the Del Piero effect.

Dwight Yorke, the Manchester United star who won the treble of FA Cup, Champions League and Premiership with the Old Trafford club, and Juninho, a World Cup winner with Brazil, were probably (along with Kewell, whose recognition with an Australian audience would have been much greater) the highest profile names to have come to the A-League. But they pale compared to Sydney's new signing Alessandro Del Piero, the Italian superstar who has generated publicity, interest, ticket sales and a media buzz unlike anything the league has seen before.

The Kewell impact was big in Melbourne but, from a distance, it seems that the Del Piero effect across the country has been even greater.

The Italian, with several Scudettos, a Champions League victory and a World Cup triumph on his CV is, after all, part of the world game's global elite. And although he is 37 he can still be expected to deliver high-calibre performances in his favoured attacking midfield role.

Not only has Del Piero galvanised interest in the A-League, but he has also put it on the map in his native country. Sydney FC's matches have been sold to former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi's MediaVest company and will be shown on Italian television - a boost not only for sponsors and those who invest in Sydney and the league, but a terrific shop window to sell the competition as a destination to other Italian players.

That element of ''missionary work'' - which never really seemed to flow on from Kewell and Yorke's time in the competition - will be crucial to developing the league as a major attraction, especially if the Socceroos fail to make the next World Cup.

Still, it should be said that television deals and ticket sales are great, but Del Piero's primary job is to deliver on the pitch, and ultimately that is where he, like Yorke, the injury-plagued Juninho and Kewell before him, will be judged.

Del Piero's decision to move here seems to have played a part in Emile Heskey and Shinji Ono, the England and Japan internationals to sign respectively for Newcastle Jets and West Sydney Wanderers.

Heskey has copped plenty of stick for being a willing workhorse whose pace (in his early years) and power makes him ideally suited to being a target man rather than a goal-scorer.

But the reality is that you don't play for a country as powerful as England (which is a regular quarter-finalist in major tournaments) and stay at the top level in the Premiership for so long if you are not a very good player. The A-League will be a major step down in terms of competitiveness, but Heskey's proven workrate and strong team ethic should allow him to fit in quickly and shine.

The same can be said of the more technical Ono, who has given West Sydney a much needed publicity boost after their cross-city rivals created all the razzle-dazzle with Del Piero. He has only just turned 33 and the veteran of the Dutch and German leagues, who has played at three World Cups for the Blue Samurai, should be a highly influential figure for the league's newest club.

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Will the A-League be a bigger deal this season than the Socceroos? Probably not. Or at least not all the time. The battle for the World Cup spot could go down to the wire and provide a cliffhanging narrative for the next eight months.

But eventually, if the game is to really succeed in this country, fans have to care about, support and turn up to watch their clubs to the point where the A-League, most of the time, is more important for the health and wellbeing of the sport than the national team. Perhaps this will be the season when that concept starts to become a reality.

Michael Lynch, The Age's expert on soccer, has had extensive experience of high level journalism in the UK and Australia. Michael has covered the Socceroos through Asia, Europe and South America in their past three World Cup campaigns. He has also reported on Grands Prix and top class motor sport from Asia and Europe. He has won several national media awards for both sports and industry journalism.